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<h1>Changes in the most recent release of Ghostscript</h1>

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<p>
This document is news about the most recent Ghostscript release.  For
earlier versions, see the history documents:

<blockquote>
<a href="History9.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 9.n</a><br>
<a href="History8.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 8.n</a><br>
<a href="History7.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 7.n</a><br>
<a href="History6.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 6.n</a><br>
<a href="History5.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 5.n</a><br>
<a href="History4.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 4.n</a><br>
<a href="History3.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 3.n</a><br>
<a href="History2.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 2.n</a><br>
<a href="History1.htm">History of Ghostscript versions 1.n</a>
</blockquote>

<p>For other information, see the <a href="Readme.htm">Ghostscript
overview</a>.

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<h2><a name="Version9.19"></a>Version 9.19 (2016-03-23)</h2>

<p>This is the thirteenth full release in the stable 9.x series, and is mainly
a maintenance release.

<p> Highlights in this release include:
<ul>
<li>
<p>
New custom PJL (near) equivalents for pdfmark and setdistillerparams. These were
primarily added to allow pdfwrite to be configured correctly for PDF/A output from
GhostPCL.
See: <a href="VectorDevices.htm#PXL_IN">pdfwrite with PCL input</a> for
more details.
<p>
Ghostscript users should continue to use the existing pdfmark and setdistillerparams
capabilities.
</li>
<li>
<p>
Metadata pdfmark is now implemented. This allows the user to
specify an XMP stream which will be written to the Catalog of the PDF
file.A new pdfmark 'Ext_Metadata' has bee defined. This takes a string
parameter which contains XML to be add to the XMP normally created by
pdfwrite.
<p>
See <a href="VectorDevices.htm#Extensions">pdfwrite pdfmark extensions</a> for more
information.
</li>
<li>
An experimental, rudimentary raster trapping implementation implementation has been
added to the Ghostscript graphics library. See <a href="Devices.htm#TIFF_trapping">Trapping</a>
for details.
</li>
<li>
<p>
The halftone threshold array generation tools (part of <code>toolbin/halftone</code>) have been
improved with <code>thresh_remap</code> which allows folding the transfer function (AKA toner
response curve (TRC)) into the threshold array so that highlights are improved. Further,
<code>gen_stochastic</code> has improved support for minimum dot size and shape.
</li>
<li>
<p>Plus the usual round of bug fixes, compatibility changes, and incremental improvements.
</li>
</ul>
<p>For a list of open issues, or to report problems,
please visit <a href="http://bugs.ghostscript.com/">bugs.ghostscript.com</a>.

<h3><a name="9.19_Incompatible_changes"></a>Incompatible changes</h3>
<ul>
<li>
<p>
(Minor) API change: copy_alpha now supports 8 bit depth (as well as the previous 2 and 4).
</li>
<li>
<p>
The gs man pages are woefully out of date and basically unmaintained. With the release
following 9.19, we intend to replace their contents with a very limited summary of (unlikely
to ever change aspects of) calling Ghostscript, and a pointer to the (maintained) HTML
documentation. That is, unless a volunteer is willing to update, and commit to
maintaining the man pages.
</li>
<li>
We plan (ideally for the release following 9.19) to somewhat tidy up the device API.
We plan to remove deprecated device procs (methods/function pointers). We also
intend to merge the imager state and graphics state (thus eliminating the
imager state), and change the device API so every device proc takes a graphics
state parameter (rather than the current scheme where only a very few procs
take an imager state parameter). This should serve as notice to anyone
maintaining a Ghostscript device outside the canonical source tree that you
may (probably will) need to update your device(s) when these changes happen.
Devices using only the non-deprecated procs should be trivial to update.
</li>
</ul>

<h3><a name="9.19_changelog"></a>Changelog</h3>

<p>See the <a href="History9.htm">history file</a> for complete log 
of changes.

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<p>
<small>Copyright &copy; 2005-2016 Artifex Software, Inc.
All rights reserved.</small>

<p>
This software is provided AS-IS with no warranty, either express or
implied.

This software is distributed under license and may not be copied, modified
or distributed except as expressly authorized under the terms of that
license.  Refer to licensing information at http://www.artifex.com/
or contact Artifex Software, Inc.,  7 Mt. Lassen Drive - Suite A-134,
San Rafael, CA  94903, U.S.A., +1(415)492-9861, for further information.

<p>
<small>Ghostscript version 9.19, 23 March 2016

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